


Last Call

by andysbrandy



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-08
Updated: 2015-03-08
Packaged: 2018-03-16 21:53:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3504092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andysbrandy/pseuds/andysbrandy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Warden Amell spent 3 years away from Alistair, looking for a cure to the Calling, but she failed. Now it's come for him, and Maker be damned if she let's him die alone</p>
            </blockquote>





	Last Call

Alistair had always known this day would come. He'd known it since the day Duncan picked him up off the ground of a ruined temple in the middle of nowhere after chugging a goblet of Darkspawn blood, and told him what being a Grey Warden meant. 

 

"It is an honor, " he'd said, handing Alistair his amulet.  "and a sacrifice."

 

Thirty years. 

 

Thirty years it's been since that day, it had seemed like such a long time to live when he was eighteen and stupid, but now it seemed like only yesterday. 

 

His teenage self would have never guessed what had happened in the past thirty years, never could have predicted killing an archdemon, leading the wardens, walking the fade. He wouldn't have predicted Solona. Their children, their life together, the friends they had made that would mourn them when they were gone.

 

He'd come a long way from the lonely little boy pulled away from the Templars, but now he felt that might not be a good thing. Too many people would hurt.

 

Rumors of cures for the calling had spread, and Solona had taken Ogrhen and Zevran to investigate. They were gone for month at a time, each time he finally saw her was the same: she'd found nothing, no hope, no future. Not for them, not for any Warden. 

 

Then she had found the cure, and when Alistair read her letter he knew it was hopeless. 

 

Blood magic. It was always blood magic. 

 

Either let the woman he loved die, let himself and his brothers die; or kill thousands for their blood to extend their lifespans in marginal amounts. 

 

Alistair was going to die.

 

She'd come home a week after he got her letter, eyes red and covered in new scars. 

 

Ogrhen looked pissed, which wasn't unusual. But Zevran didn't make a single joke for the rest of the day and that was the most tragic.

 

"I am no Grey Warden," he'd said after a few drinks had him smiling again. "But somehow I ended up with far too many friends who are, and it will be a sad day when I must let them go" 

 

Solona had refused to speak to Alistair in the courtyard, refused to speak to anyone else at all. Not that there was any need to, she'd written it all down for a reason, so she only had to tell the story once. 

 

She didn't need to talk, she needed to lock their bedroom door and cry, because the world was unfair and she was going to watch him die or become a monster to save his life, and both of those would mean losing him forever. 

 

He didn't need to say anything to comfort her, they were beyond that, all he did was take her in his arms and let her cry because she had failed him, failed everyone, she'd wasted so much of the little time they had left chasing answers that didn't exist, cures they could never use.

 

"We still have nearly twenty years, my love" he reminded her gently, some time later.

 

"Yes" she agreed, and wiped her eyes. She smiled that crooked smile, it was sadder now, but still hers. "We should live it."

 

And that night, they made their son, and the nightmares didn't come for either of them.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~

 

But now they had, worse than ever before. 

 

Solona was still asleep beside him, he'd learned to wake quietly from bad dreams to avoid waking her, and he knew she did the same. But they always woke up tangled in each other, clinging to their anchor that let them navigate the nightmares.

 

She looked so peaceful in the rising sunlight, he was tempted to not tell her, but this was a pact they'd made long ago.

 

She looked so much older, wrinkles beginning to show around her eyes, and grey in her hair. But he'd wanted her to look even more so, see her hair whiten with age, her whole face crossed with lines that weren't scars as she smiled and played with grandchildren they would never see.  

 

"Solona, my love, wake up." He whispered, shaking her shoulder. "It's time."

 

She stirred awake and looked at him. There were no tears this time, no angry shouts cursing the maker, just a grim acceptance. 

 

"Then let's go" she said.

 

"You don't need to do this," Alistair heard himself saying "you still have weeks to live, months even-" 

 

"I will not leave you to die alone for a few extra months."

 

"Duncan and Wynne-"

 

"Are nearly full grown, and they knew this day was coming since they learned to speak, they're prepared. Possibly more so than us."

 

"I know love, but-"

 

"This argument is twenty years dead Alistair. I will not live in a world without you and you know you can't talk me out of it. You'd be doing the same thing if my calling had come first."

 

Alistair sighed. "I know" he finally said, and pulled her close. They would worry about this later, because as soon as he got out of bed, all of this nightmare became real. 

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

It took a week to be ready to leave, the Grey Wardens had been all but exterminated 20 years before, and most of the Wardens in Weisshaupt now, were newer recruits. The Calling farewells they'd seen were few in number, and none quite as significant as the Hero of Ferelden and the Savior of the Wardens. Wynne and Duncan both arrived teary eyed, Duncan from the Hossberg circle where he taught healing, and Wynne from Antiva with Zevran where a deep roads hole had opened up. They had gone as "official Darkspawn consultants" on the request of Josephine when Solona had said they could not spare any actual wardens. Zev always made jokes about how they had gotten the names wrong, the mage had been named for the warrior, and the warrior for the mage, but Duncan could be stoic and dangerous, if he wanted to, and Wynne was constantly overheard telling her brother and parents to clean up after themselves despite being the youngest. 

 

But neither of them has seen true war, and Duncan mostly chose to avoid any kind of fight if he could. They were good kids, and Solona and Alistair wanted them to enjoy the world the two of them had fought so hard to save, even when their parents were gone. 

 

~~~~~~~~~~

 

A vote was help for a new warden commander, and Bethany Hawke would be their successor. She was a capable fighter and a powerful mage, but she had also been through a hell of her own, and maintained a kind heart through it all. Some called her soft, but after everything that had happened in the years before, maybe they all needed a little kindheartedness. 

 

~~~~~~~~~~~

 

There were a dozen entrances to the deep roads in the Anderfels alone, and a dozen more on the way, but Orzammar was where they wanted to go, partly for the long trip they would spend with their children, and partly so they could die on familiar ground. They rode horses at first, five of them, sharing stories around campfires like they'd done so long ago. Duncan told them of a way he'd nearly figured out how to stop a woman's monthly bleeding, without stopping it forever. Wynne would laugh and tell him to let her know when he figured that out, because she needed it, and Zevran would act surprised and disgusted until he broke the act and laughed with her. Then he would tell stories he had told a million times, about nearly killing and being killed by the people he know considered his family, and stories he hadn't told before, like the first night their parents had spent together in a camp just like this one, and him and Leliana had been listening outside the entire time, giggling. 

 

Solona and Alistair sat quietly in the background, leaning on each other and listening to the family they had built bicker and laugh. They all had a future, had hope and goals and dreams that didn't end when this trip was over. Alistair was proud of his children, and he knew they would thrive, even with him gone. But the reality of their road trip hung in the atmosphere like a storm cloud, and he knew everyone else could feel it too.

 

~~~~~~~~~

 

They passed through Val Royeaux and said goodbye to Leliana, who's hair was not yet greying, but she would have plenty time in the future. She hugged them both, and cried, and spent the rest of the night getting progressively more intoxicated and loose lipped about her own stories of the heroes of Ferelden. Leliana had never met Duncan, but she told stories of the original Wynne, the sweet old woman who mended their clothes and healed their wounds, and could take on five grown Knights on her own with one hand making dinner. When the morning came and it was time to go, Leliana begged them to stay another night, but Alistair was getting pale and sickly, and fighting through the deep roads required being able to stand by yourself. 

 

They left three of the horses in Val Royeaux and chartered a carriage. The plan was to alternate drivers between Zevran, Wynne and Duncan, but the outdoor drivers seat held all three of them, and the inside carriage was depressing, since all Alistair did was sleep, and Solona just looked at him on the verge of tears while she ran her fingers through his hair. 

 

They arrived at Orzammar a month after Alistairs' first dream. Sleeping through almost the entirety of the second half of the journey had helped, and he looked no worse than he had in Val Royeaux. 

 

Ogrhen met them at the gates, along with a host of dwarves, elves and humans come to pay their respects to the heroes who had survived a dragon and an attempted genocide, only to be killed by the very part of them that had allowed them to survive their past.  

 

The red headed dwarf was surprisingly sober, especially considering that he was about to lose two of his only friends, and his own harrowing would be coming up in a matter of months. 

 

He'd talked about going with them when Alistairs' time came, but that had been twenty years ago. Now he was a grandfather, and had time left to say goodbye. 

 

The admirers had been left behind as they approached the deep roads, and the six of them walked in silence. Duncan now held his mothers staff, and she carried a cheap replacement staff bought off an Orzammar merchant before he'd enchanted it. She didn't have need of quality weapons anymore, she was down here to die, how much of a fight she put up was only going to depend on how long she could stay standing. 

 

They found a hoard an hour in, and Alistair knew it was time. Goodbyes had been said in the carriage, everyone knew it would be too difficult to do once they were inside. 

 

Alistair saw a flutter of midnight black wings in the rafters overhead, and smiled, because he knew they would come. All three of his children here to say goodbye, like he was an old man dying in his bed surrounded by loved ones. Well, and Morrigan. And the fact that he wasn't that old, he was not going to die in a bed, and only Solona would be with him when the time came.

 

Duncan and Wynne hugged their parents one last time, and Zevran kissed both Wardens on the forehead and promised to look after their children, for whatever his supervision was worth. Ogrhen started to reach out his hand, but rolled his eyes and pulled them both down to his level instead, and squeezed them tight. 

 

"It's been a fuckin' honor" he grunted, and pushed them back to their feet. "I'll see you both soon, wherever we end up."

 

"See you soon Ogrhen" Solona said, and turned to look at the other three. "And I better not see any of you for a very long time"

 

"We love you guys" Alistair added quickly, because he didn't trust his voice to get out more than that without breaking. 

 

They all stood staring for a moment, because the time had finally come. Solona grabbed his hand and laced their fingers together, and the others turned to leave. They weren't going to watch, they couldn't, and Alistair and Solona had to wait until they had turned the farthest corner to charge the hoard. The ravens were still there, but they both knew that Morrigan wouldn't get involved, she understood the sacrifice, and watching her friends get ripped apart by Darkspawn was probably a form of closure for her, the only way to accept they were actually dead. 

 

"Are you ready love?" He asked, when he saw the last glimpse of his daughter disappear. 

 

"Of course not" she answered, and he realized they'd both been squeezing the others' hand until neither of them had any feeling. It wouldn't matter anyway. This wasn't a fight they were going to win

 

They turned from the roads to face the hoard. Alistair drew his sword, but left his shield on his back so that he wouldn't have to let go. Darkspawn be damned, nothing in this world or the next was going to separate them now. He turned to kiss her, one last time, and they charged. 

**Author's Note:**

> Zevran's in it a lot because I know if you romance him he goes with you to find a cure, but lets be real he's got nothing better to do and all his friends are going to die at like 50 so I assume he goes anyway, and sticks around after because he likes kids and having friends that don't try to kill him (anymore). And Ogrhen because Ogrhen is cool. 
> 
> Also I know Bethany was made a Warden pretty early in DA2 so it seems like her calling would be pretty soon after Alistairs', but her turning is after the blight and over a year in Kirkwall so her calling is probably around 2 and a half to 3 years away based on my terrible math and I like Bethany so she gets to be in charge when I kill everyone else.
> 
> (EDIT: i spelled solona's name solana the entire fic lmao sorry my Amells was named Akilah but i like to use default names in fics so everyone can enjoy them that's my excuse for being dumb)


End file.
